Nomura hires UBS analyst Schorr

The Japanese bank, pushing to join the ranks of global finance giants, hired well-known U.S. banks analyst Glenn Schorr.

Schorr had been with UBS since 2003. He is familiar to followers of firms such as Morgan Stanley and JPMorgan Chase for often being the first analyst on banks’ quarterly earnings conference calls to ask questions of management.

In April’s Goldman Sachs call, for instance, Schorr asked seven questions before another perennial first asker, Guy Moszkowski of Bank of America Merrill Lynch, got a word in edgewise. Schorr’s queries ranged from the status of Goldman’s legal woes to why risk-weighted assets increased in the latest quarter.

Schorr maintains his distance, however. A search of the Factiva database suggests Schorr has never once said "great quarter" to a bank CEO, at least not publicly.

The hiring comes as Nomura, the biggest brokerage firm in Japan, tries to build on its worldwide expansion. The firm has won high ratings from Institutional Investor for its research in Asia and Europe, following its bust-era purchase of the investment banking operations of Lehman Brothers Holdings. Now it has set its sights on the United States as well.

“The addition of Glenn represents another step toward the development of a top-tier U.S. equity research franchise for Nomura,” said U.S. equity research chief Michael Rietbrock, who himself joined Nomura this year from Bank of America Merrill Lynch.